A day in the life of a gardener is all but predictable or mundane. There is something new and exciting every single day, although there are some common threads of routine to connect one dusk to the next dawn. Plant, water, prune, weed, harvest. There’s a peace in that routine, but adventure in everything else.
The only time this adventure slows is when the days shorten and the temperatures drop and the rain turns to soft fluffy snow. After the last crops have been harvested, and the winter growers have been planted, what is there to do other than wait? Well, exactly that. Wait for the days to get longer and for the temperatures to rise, for the soil to thaw and the snow to become a quenching rain again.
It’s common knowledge, or at least it should be, that no gardener can ever just sit still and wait around for anything so winter is the time for planning. What are we growing this coming spring? Should I build a new raised bed to go here? Can we clear all this out and put crops down on it? Even though very little is actively growing, there’s always work to be done.
Members of the City Harvest Program attend an annual meeting in which gardeners get together with the Philly Horticultural Society and all of the above winter questions can be addressed and discussed. PHS is a resource for gardeners to utilize and by supported by. They provide a number of services to individual gardeners and the participating urban farms that span across the city to help them flourish and be as productive as they can be.
At this year’s City Harvest winter meeting, playing at the front of the room was City Harvest: A Growing Community, the second documentary to be made about the City Harvest Program. The film played on as more and more people shuffled into the venue, which was the fifth floor of PHS headquarters. It’s an office building, but the seventy-five or so people who turned out packed themselves in the employee kitchen and lounge. Termite’s very own Deb Rudman, creator of the documentary, informed me that gardeners can squeeze as many as they need to in any given space.
As an outsider looking in, it was like going to a family reunion. Everybody was so happy to see each other. A new arrival would see someone they know, go and hug them and chat for a bit, and then go sit in the rows of chairs facing the screen and watch the documentary until it was announced that the food was ready to be self-served.
When I say it was like a family reunion, I really mean it was like a family barbeque. Classic comfort food with a bit of a twist: chili, roasted veggies, coleslaw; all catered by the Free Brunch Program. After the food was served, we all sat and watched the documentary for a bit while we ate before the presentations began.
Adam Hill introduced the documentary we’d all been watching with a tip of the hat to Deb, followed by a very informative and emotional discussion by Truelove Seeds about seed saving and its importance to preserving culture. Afterwards, PHS discussed the upcoming spring growing season, which is really what every gardener had been anticipating the entire evening.
I had spent the whole first half of the evening watching people watch the work in progress documentary. Half were sitting in the rows of chairs, half standing and chatting while they watched it and all I saw were smiles and a sort of pride to see their work being displayed up on the screen.
A special thanks to the Philadelphia Horticultural Society, the City Harvest Program, Deb Rudman, Termite TV, Truelove Seeds, and the Free Brunch Program.